The New Russian Loan

Written:Written after December 16 (29), 1904Published:First published in 1931 inLenin Miscellany, XVI.

      Published according to the manuscript.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Foreign Languages Publishing House,1962,

      Moscow,Volume 8,

      pages41-42.Translated:Bernard Isaacs and The Late Isidor LaskerTranscription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive

      (2003).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

Underthe above headline, theFrankfurter Zeitung, mouthpiece of the
big German stockjobbers, gives the following interesting report:

“Rumoursof a new big Russian loan have been current for several weeks
now. All these rumours were promptly denied. It is now officially admitted,
however, that a loan was recently [reported on December 29, new style]
negotiated in St. Petersburg. No doubt, these official negotiations were preceded by private inquiries, which gave rise to the rumours. It is reported that
German financiers took part this time in the negotiations. The loan is to be
floated on the German market. Until now, since the beginning of the war, Russia
has raised funds in three different ways: first, about 300 million rubles was
borrowed from the cash holdings of the Treasury, in creased by cuts in previous
allocations. This was followed by a loan of 800 million francs (about 300
million rubles) obtained through French bankers. In August Russia floated a
domes tic loan of 150 million rubles. The war is consuming heavy sums which are
growing from month to month, and Russia is again planning to raise a big foreign
loan. Russian stocks have recently shown a strong (serious,bedenkliche) downward trend. How the German public will react to the
Russian loan is unpredictable. The fortunes of war, so far, have invariably
favoured the Japanese. And whereas, so far, Russian loans have been considered a
safe investment, they are now becoming more or less speculative
(Beigeschmack), especially in view of the tsar’s recent Manifesto,
which throws characteristic light on what is going on in Russia. It remains to
be seen whether the new loan will be offered to the German public on terms (the
interest rate and the price of issue) that would make up for the impaired
quality of the Russian loan."— — —

Anotherwarning to the Russian autocracy by the European bourgeoisie! It is
      losing credit as a result both of the military defeats and of the growing
      discontent within the country. The European bankers are beginning to
      regard the autocracy as a gambling speculation, while the
      “quality” of Russian loans, in the sense of their reliability,
      is frankly declared to be impaired.

Andwhat a mass of money this criminal war, which must be consuming no less thanthree million rubles a day, is still going to cost the people!